Related papers: Fitting Zodiacal Models
Differential spectroscopy during exoplanet transits permits to reconstruct spectra of small stellar surface portions that successively become hidden behind the planet. The center-to-limb behavior of stellar line shapes, asymmetries and…
The lifetime of a satellite is limited, and its calibration may be not stable, it is necessary to continue ground-based measures of the solar diameter with methods less affected by atmospheric turbulence, and optical aberrations: planetary…
Astrophysics and cosmology can be used to test the standard model of particle physics under conditions and over distance and time scales not accessible to laboratory experiments. Most of the astrophysical observations are in good agreement…
The phase or orbital light curves of extrasolar terrestrial planets in reflected or emitted light will contain information about their atmospheres and surfaces complementary to data obtained by other techniques such as spectrosopy. We show…
The cosmic far-infrared background is now well measured from 140 micron to 1 mm. Uncertainties remain at 100 micron (and even more at 60 micron). These are dominated by limitations of the zodiacal model. The nature of sources dominating the…
Rings around giant exoplanets (hereafter 'exorings') are still a missing planetary phenomenon among the vast number of discovered planets. Despite the fact there exist a large number of methods for identifying and characterizing these…
Observing habitable exoplanets that may resemble Earth is a key priority in astronomy that is dependent on not only detecting such worlds, but also ascertaining that apparent signatures of habitability are not due to other sources. Space…
We investigate the constraints that Olbers Paradox, applied to the Zodiacal Background as measured from space, sets on outer solar system objects. If extended to very faint limits, R = 40--50 mag, the steep optical luminosity function (LF)…
Terrestrial exoplanets are on the verge of joining the ranks of astronomically accessible objects. Interpreting their observable characteristics, and informing decisions on instrument design and use, will hinge on the ability to model these…
Several models which have been constructed to explain the faint galaxy excess in observed number counts are used to predict the intensity of the extragalactic background light (EBL). Special attention is given to irregular and dwarf…
The large majority of stars in the Milky Way are late-type dwarfs, and the frequency of low-mass exoplanets in orbits around these late-type dwarfs appears to be high. In order to characterize the radiation environments and habitable zones…
The solar diameter changes or not? Whatever will be the answer the methods used for its measurements are more and more challenging, and facing new astrophysical and optical problems since the required space resolution is of astrometric…
Current data broadly support trends of galaxy surface brightness profile amplitude and shape with total stellar mass predicted by state-of-the-art Lambda-CDM cosmological simulations, although recent results show signs of interesting…
Cosmological observables are used to construct cosmological models. Since cosmological observations are limited to the light cone, a fixed number of observables (even measured to arbitrary accuracy) may not uniquely determine a cosmological…
We describe calculations of the evolution of an ensemble of small planetesimals in the outer solar system. In a solar nebula with a mass of several times the Minimum Mass Solar Nebula, objects with radii of 100-1000 km can form on…
The sky observed by space telescopes in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) can be dominated by stray light from multiple sources including the Earth, Sun and Moon. This stray light presents a significant challenge to missions that aim to make a secure…
The extragalactic background light (EBL) is of fundamental importance both for understanding the entire process of galaxy evolution and for gamma-ray astronomy. However, the overall spectrum of the EBL between 0.1 and 1000 microns has never…
The study of the Extragalactic Background Light (EBL) is crucial to understand many astrophysical problems (as the formation of first stars, the evolution of galaxies and the role of dust emission). At present, one of the most powerful ways…
The detection of massive planets orbiting nearby stars has become almost routine, but current techniques are as yet unable to detect terrestrial planets with masses comparable to the Earth's. Future space-based observatories to detect…
The light curve of an exoplanetary transit can be used to estimate the planetary radius and other parameters of interest. Because accurate parameter estimation is a non-analytic and computationally intensive problem, it is often useful to…